


Wait for Me, I'm Coming too

by ReyWhomst



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Mortis - Freeform, Reylo - Freeform, WBW
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-27
Updated: 2020-01-27
Packaged: 2021-02-19 02:48:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22437289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReyWhomst/pseuds/ReyWhomst
Summary: Post TROS, a determined Rey ventures to the World Between Worlds to bring Ben Solo back.Meanwhile, Ben wakes up in the unfamiliar plane and must confront his past to find his future.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 6
Kudos: 21





	1. Chapter 1

“I’ll come back for you sweetheart. I promise,” Ben whispered softly in Rey’s ear. 

She hadn’t understood him at the time. Come back for her? They were holding each other. She could feel the coarse linen of his shirt on the tips of her fingers.Her other hand savored the softness of his check as she cupped it. He was right there. They were closer than they’d ever been. Why would he need to come back? Seconds before, their lips had been pressed into the sweetest kiss of her life. Seconds later, his body slumped to the floor. 

Rey had never felt such grief. Getting out of the temple had been a challenge unto itself. She had almost waited until it was too late. The very darkness that she had so recently overcome by his side, called to her. Its voice had never been louder, and the sound had never been sweeter. The throne was so close, the power was so close. She could bring him back to her. If she embraced her legacy, if she swore herself to the sith, she could see that smile again so soon. Was it truly an embrace of darkness if she did it for love? 

“I’ll come back for you sweetheart. I promise.” The words echoed in her head, and she knew she had to wait. He had promised her that there was still a way for him. Ben had known she needed to hear it, known that he had to help her reject the darkness one more time. It was so tempting, too tempting, to take the shortcut. To have him back in her arms in seconds, instead of having to count the days again. 

“Do you still count the days?” Kylo’s question from the Star Destroyer played in her mind, and she felt the conflict in her surge once more. 

She didn’t have to count them anymore. She took a step. She didn’t have to be alone. She stepped again. She could take the power she needed…

Rey stopped herself just short of the throne. No. Kylo Ren was dead, and Ben Solo wanted more for her. They would be together again, of that she was determined, but she wouldn’t turn to the darkness. She wouldn’t let The Emperor have the satisfaction of manipulating them again,even in death. They had escaped his grasp together, and now their journey was their own. 

Rey made her way back to the X-Wing through sheer force of will. She flew the ship around the debris of the battle, the figures of fallen Star Destroyers blurred through her tears. She just had to wait until the jump. Then, she could give in to them. Rey set a course for Battuu, pulled the lever to activate the HyperDrive, and slumped back into her chair. Her body heaved as she broke down into a mess of sobs and gasps. She felt the cockpit spin as the hyperventilating started. The stars flew by. 

………………...

_ Five months and thirteen..fourteen.. _ “Fifteen Days,” Rey mumbled to herself as she scratched another tally. She was in a little-explored corner of The Falcon, a flashlight in one hand and a small knife in the other. A loose metal plate above the bunk in the main cabin was barely discernible and, when you moved it just right, you could access a storage compartment. It was probably used for smuggling less than legal items in The Falcon’s early days. Years later it smuggled something much more precious to her: a boy, strong in the force but unsure of himself, hid here to sneak on adventures with his father. “Ben Solo”: Rey lovingly traced her fingers over the carving of his name, taking care to feel each letter. How had he made it so beautiful? She could barely scratch the tallys straight, but his writing was a work of art. She started to wonder if it  _ was _ art, had he studied calligraphy? 

A bepping in the cabin broke her away from her musings. Rey dropped down into the bunk, and carefully replaced the false ceiling. 

“BB-8. Are we close?” She asked as she stepped back into the room. A series of quick beeps from the droid confirmed that they were. 

“Good. Thank you BB.” Rey said as she moved into the cockpit. She had to prepare to come out of hyperdrive, and it was going to be a bumpy landing. The Falcon’s navigation wasn’t equipped to touch down on the planet. Strictly speaking, no ship’s was. To Rey’s knowledge, no one had charted this place before. The land was scattered with rock formations like Rey had never seen. Boulders with rounded edges stood beside pillars of stone all towering above the surface. They covered most of the planet, leaving only small patches of habitable grasslands between them. It was on one of these patches that Rey carefully landed the falcon. 

She went to bunk and pulled the texts from underneath. Behind her BB-8 beeped. 

“No BB, you can’t come with me this time. It's too dangerous.”

Beeps of protest resonated from the ball droid. 

“Because I’m better equipped for it than you! Besides,” Rey smiled as she gestured to the small figure beside him, “D-O will need someone to help him watch the Falcon.” She took her staff from beside the bed and strapped it to her back. She felt for her saber on the small table, amidst a pile of notes and scrap, and securely clipped it to her belt. When she was certain she was ready, she pressed the button for The Falcon’s exit ramp. 

Her march to the surface was interrupted by a sudden bump at her heels. D-O had followed her down the ramp, and was now looking up at her. 

“D-d-don’t go.” He stammered sadly.

Rey knelt down beside the droid, and placed a gentle hand on his head. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll be back before you know it, and I’ll bring someone who I know will love you,” she said with a smile. 

D-O trilled with excitement and scurried up the ramp where BB was waiting for him. Rey took a final look at them, and The Falcon, then faced ahead towards the Temple. 

The temple on the surface was ancient. Jedi symbols that outdated even the Old Republic decorated the various walls of the place. Some of them were recognizable to Rey from the texts she’d gotten on Ach-To. Others, she’d never seen anywhere before in her life. The temple complex was immense. It was like a city on its own, cloisters of buildings scattered the plaza. The grass between the rows of edifices formed a foot path that led to the main structure. Vines and overgrowth snaked along cracked stone walls. Stepped roofs surrounded her, towering towards the sky, as tall as her shadow elongated on the sands of Jakku. 

As she walked past the archways, Rey could see light coming from deep in some of the halls of the temple refuge. What could the light be? Kyber crystals? A shrine? An undiscovered Holocron or even another wayfinder? She didn’t have the time to find out. What she was here for lay in front of her, in front of the main temple. 

Statues of three figures stood watch in the center of a circle of purpled stone. Luminous shapes embedded in the circle caught the dim light of the sun. This place had an energy all its own, the force didn’t just feel strong here. It felt alive. It whirled across the courtyard as a Vulptex does through salt. Rey knelt down to get a better look at what lay ingrained in the stone. To her surprise, she found the shapes of fractured kyber crystals there, all scattered in thousands of colors across the plaza. They cast colored lights on their keepers, the statues of The Ones. 

Rey had read about them, but not in the Jedi Texts. They were in the texts yes, but it appeared that the Jedi seemed to interpret them as metaphors. The Daughter, with free flowing robes, long pale-green hair, cast in an ever-glow of light, was the giver of life. She represented the light side of the force. The Son, with glowing red eyes, face lined with scarlet, and black robes shrouding him in dusk, was a force of destruction and a bringer of death. He represented the dark side of the force. Finally, The Father, his age and wisdom marked by his lined face and white hair, was the force that bound The Daughter and The Son. He ensured that no one should grow too powerful, and represented the balance in the force. 

That is what the Jedi believed, but Rey knew that they were more than metaphors and fables. They had been real. Alive. Force users with power beyond the imagination of any Jedi or Sith. Sifting through the books she’d “liberated” from Ach-To, she found Luke’s notes on the subject. They were scrawled in the margins of a mission report that dated back to the Clone Wars. Anakin Skywalker, along with Obi-Wan and Ahsoka Tano, had met with them on a planet that was uncharted and impossible to reach. It was called Mortis. The Ones had perished during the mission, but the three Jedi managed to escape. 

Rey had no idea how Luke had gotten the report. But after he did, he researched The Ones and Mortis nearly to obsession. Luke’s exploration on the subject filled a multitude of journals. After Ben's death, Rey had pored over them looking for something, anything, that could reconnect them. She found her hope in The World Between Worlds. 

The name was a misnomer. It wasn’t a world, not really. It was a metaphysical plane within the force itself. In it every event, the past, the present, and future, connected. Space and time held no power in that place, and neither did life or death. Rey had glimpsed it herself, lying on the ground at The Emperor’s feet, all but dead. The Jedi had reached her. People who had lived and died long before her. They connected themselves to her, leant her the strength to pull herself from the ground. The force had given her the power to defeat her greatest enemy, now she hoped it would lend her the same power to save her greatest love. 

How to access the plane was the problem. For all his notes and speculation, it seemed Luke had never personally stepped foot in the World Between Worlds. 

“Thank you for the wisdom  _ master _ ,” Rey mumbled sarcastically as she paced the stone circle. He had helped her get to the planet, helped her know what to look for, but he hadn’t finished the job. She had no idea how to open the portal. 

Rey was going in circles and she knew it. She paced circles in her mind, read paragraphs of circles in the notes, and walked circles in the stone…

Circles in the stone?!

Rey stopped and looked down. She hadn’t noticed it before, but there were circles there. Lots of them. Outer circles connecting to smaller inner circles through arched lines. In each inner circle, a kyber crystal shone, perfectly centered. They were all connected to each other. Almost like…

“A star map!” Rey exclaimed. Her voice echoed off of the temple facades, too loud in the deafening silence. 

Her heart raced. Maps could be read, accessed. This code was not unbreakable. She could reach him. She just had to find the right path. Staring at the circle on the ground, Rey knew she was too close to it. To find the path she had to be able to read the map. What she needed was height. A full view of the courtyard. Rey starred up at the stepped roofs that towered above the temple grounds. She looked at the stone walls again, at the ivy that formed the perfect ladder. Who knew that her scavenger skills could intersect so perfectly with her Jedi powers? Rey smiled as she tucked her books into her pack, secured her staff to her back, and prepared to climb. 

From the top of the tower it all seemed so clear: the circles intersected between The Daughter and the Son, at the feet of The Father. The light and the darkness. Balance. Rey had needed both once to see Ben through the mask of Kylo. Now she would need both again to bring him back to her. She lay her staff on the ground, and sat on the bare stone: both legs crossed, eyes closed, hands on the earth. She felt the energy of the place. The destruction and violence when the Jedi destroyed the Sith Temple that had once stood there.The hopes and happiness of the students who trained within the walls. The energy and call of each kyber crystal: each unique, with its own powers its own voice. They spoke to her, and Rey listened. She heard the voices of the force users before her. Jedi, Sith, and all in-between came together in a chorus of clarity, and the path illuminated. The circles that intersected between The Son and Daughter lit up, and a black portal opened at the base of The Father.

Rey climbed down the Ivy and stood before it. In the void she could barely see the pin points of glimmering stars…

“Here we go.” 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben wakes up in an unfamiliar place, with no idea of how he got there. He has to go through his memories to try to piece something together and make a plan. But who has time for plans when a mysterious figure is walking towards you?

Ben woke up, surrounded by darkness. He looked around the void. Pinpoints of light connected to illuminated pathways steadily glowing in the darkness. Where was he?

He remembered he was with Rey. The memory of her lips pressed against his and the dazzling brilliance of her smile wasn't one he'd soon forget. For the first time in his life, he had felt balanced. The happiness he felt was so powerful that it almost numbed the pain. Almost…

He had been hurt badly when he was thrown. He wasn't sure what bones were broken, or more accurately which ones weren't, as he laid at the bottom of the rocky trench on Exogol. He didn't care. He only cared about getting to her. 

He struggled up the cliff face, pain coursing through him with every movement. Every slip, every misstep, even every successful ascent sent a fresh wave of suffering through his body. But it was nothing compared to the agony he felt when he reached the top. Rey laid still, eyes open, hands cold, and heart silent. Ben crawled to her desperately and took her in his arms for the first time.

Her body was heavy, lifeless. It was...wrong. Rey was so full of light, bursting with life. To see her like this was a perversion of the force. It was unnatural. There had to be something, someone who could help… anyone. He looked around the ruined chamber, but there was no one in sight. The force was silent and grief began to consume him. 

But then Ben Solo thought of Rey. He thought of hee reaching out and healing him on The Death Star ruins. How had she done it? He'd heard of Jedi that were able to heal, but he'd never seen it. It was rare, even in the days of the Old Republic. After the Empire rose, it was nearly unheard of. How was it achieved? 

Ben recalled the feeling. It felt like relief. It was as if Rey had reached through him, through all of the pain, the torture, the memories, the darkness and found his soul. She touched his central force, cracked and damaged and conflicted, and she restored it.

"Only a Jedi can heal Ben," his uncle's words from long ago echoed in his head. He had been looking at a holo of Padme, days after discovering what his true lineage was. "Darth Vader had turned to the darkness, and that is why he couldn't save her." 

Ben looked at Rey in his arms and knew what he had to do.

"Well there are no Jedi here master," Ben asserted, determination growing, "So I'll just have to do it myself." 

Ben placed his hands on Rey's abdomen and focused. He centered himself on her, meditating, trying desperately to reach her. He envisioned her smile, her frown, her laugh, and her tears. He saw her, fierce as fire and burning with determination, as she fought in Snoke's throne room. Next, he saw her face, tear-streaked and glowing, as she softly spoke to him by the fire on Ach-to. 

Then, the scene shifted. He felt the sands of Jakku beneath his feet. Heard the crying of the girl. He felt her desperation to gain a few hours of sleep before the hot sun rose and she had to earn her next meal. He felt her hunger pangs in his stomach. His soul was heavy with her solemn loneliness, her isolation. He had to go deeper. 

What was her essence? The force that made her? Rey had so much pain in her past. All the tears, the hunger, the anger, the desperation, the endless days scratching tallies in the metal waiting for parents that would never come. How had she overcome it all?

Ben smiled as he finally found it. Hope. Hope that her parents would come back, hope for a better life, hope that the Resistance would triumph, hope that he himself could be turned. Rey was made of hope. Ben sensed it all around him as he connected with her, the force was strong within him now, and he directed it on her injuries as it overcame him. In his arms, her body stirred and Ben felt life return to Rey.

"Ben, " Rey said as she embraced him. To Ben, they were the sweetest words he'd ever heard spoken because she was alive to say them. Just when he thought he couldn't be happier, she had pressed her lips against his and proved him wrong. At that moment, he was the happiest man in the galaxy. But then, he felt his body start to give in, and he began to fade...

The memories were becoming clearer to Ben, as he sat in the dark void which he now occupied. His vision had started to go, and blackness was closing in on him as he held Rey. But out of the darkness, a light appeared, and a voice reassured him. 

"It's going to be alright now, " the voice said as he felt his body go limp. And somehow, Been knew it was true. This wasn't the end of him, he and Rey would be together again in time. They had to be. They were fated to balance the force as one. He felt it, but he needed Rey to understand too. "I'll come back for you sweetheart, I promise, " he whispered the words to her, using the last of his strength before the darkness closed in and he woke up...here. 

But where was here? Clear memories aside, he still didn't know where he was. He would need to figure it out fast and get back to Rey. A sudden noise, the echoing falls of footsteps, broke Ben out of his musings. He turned towards the source and saw a distant figure awash in light. It moved towards him, drawing closer as he pulled a sleeved arm over his eyes to shield them from the brightness.

"Who are you?" Ben called out to the figure.  
"Someone who loves you, " his mother's voice answered back.


End file.
